Back to the Future: Music from the Motion Picture Soundtrack is the soundtrack album to the film of the same name. It was released on July 8, 1985 by MCA Records. The album included two tracks culled from Alan Silvestri's compositions for the film, two tracks from Huey Lewis and the News, two songs played by the fictional band Marvin Berry and The Starlighters, one played by Marty McFly and The Starlighters, and two pop songs that are only very briefly heard in the background of the film.

To put the tracks in the chronological order they first appear in the film, the listing would be as such: 1, 2, 7, the first 90 seconds of 6, 8, 9, 10, the remainder of 6, 4, 5 and 3. The "Back to the Future Overture" on the original album is made up of the following cues as released on the subsequent score album:

Marty's Letter

Clocktower (:50 - 5:35)

'85 Lone Pine Mall (1:41 - end)

A 1999 CD release entitled The Back to the Future Trilogy featured additional compositions by Silvestri from the first film. However, these were re-recordings by the Scottish National Orchestra and not Silvestri's original recordings.[5]

The musical material ostensibly performed by the characters Marty McFly, Marvin Berry and the Starlighters in the film, was recorded by Harry Waters, Jr. as Marvin Berry and Mark Campbell as Marty McFly, and the guitar solo by Tim May. (Campbell and May received a "Special Thanks" acknowledgment in the film's end credits, with the recording credit going to the fictional characters.) Berry's group also plays the song "Night Train", first recorded by Jimmy Forrest in 1951.[6]

In the film, Marvin Berry, a fictitious cousin of Chuck Berry, phones Chuck and lets him listen to the music. The real Johnny B. Goode was released only three years after the time it is played in the film.[7]

There is also another album version of the soundtrack, with only the original score by Silvestri. The only legitimate release was by independent label Intrada,[8] but another so-called "DeLorean" version released in the 1990s was an unauthorized bootleg.[9]

In November 2009, Intrada released an official two-disc album containing Silvestri's complete score. The first disc contained the complete orchestral score as recorded for the finished film, along with two source cues that Silvestri wrote. The second disc consisted of alternate approaches that Silvestri took with a large portion of the score, with a darker, more serious tone.

None of the songs from the first album are included in this score-only album, and for moments in the film where Silvestri's score was shortened (i.e. the final moments of "Einstein Disintegrated" and "Peabody Barn; Marty Ditches DeLorean"), replaced with source music ("Town Square") or unused ("Logo"), the full score cue is presented as originally recorded.

The set was a limited edition of 10,000 units and sold nearly 6,000 by the end of January 2010.[10] It sold out in August 2014; however, on October 12, 2015 it was made available as an unlimited release in a single-disc edition, featuring the music on disc one of the two-disc set.[11]